


There's No Spring in You, Boy

by mytimehaspassed



Category: Graceland (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gang World, Drug Dealing, Drug Use, F/F, F/M, M/M, Murder
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-27
Updated: 2014-08-27
Packaged: 2018-02-14 23:27:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,133
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2207064
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/mytimehaspassed/pseuds/mytimehaspassed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The first time Carlito touches Johnny, it’s a rough swipe of his hand across Johnny’s jaw, blood smearing in his palm’s wake. Johnny was fourteen, and it was blood in blood out, two broken ribs, a swollen lip, a concussion that his ma nurses with a wet towel and disappointed fingers, wishing that she had moved out of the neighborhood when she had the chance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	There's No Spring in You, Boy

**THERE'S NO SPRING IN YOU, BOY**  
GRACELAND  
Johnny/Carlito; Paige/Charlie; Johnny/Lucia; Paige/Charlie/Johnny; Johnny/OMCs; Johnny/OFCs  
 **WARNINGS** : Gang activity; drug usage and drug dealing; murder; underage sex  
 **NOTES** : Gang!AU, with bisexual!Johnny to make up for the distinct lack of it in the show

  
**1.**  


The first time Carlito touches Johnny, it’s a rough swipe of his hand across Johnny’s jaw, blood smearing in his palm’s wake. Johnny was fourteen, and it was blood in blood out, two broken ribs, a swollen lip, a concussion that his ma nurses with a wet towel and disappointed fingers, wishing that she had moved out of the neighborhood when she had the chance.

Carlito had crouched down beside Johnny on the pavement, when all Johnny could see was blood and dirty sneakers, and he had christened Johnny with Johnny’s own blood, telling him that he had done alright, saying, his voice rough and low to Johnny’s ears, “We’re brothers now.”

The others had clapped him hard on the back, sharp, violent pushes and pulls, but it’s Carlito’s touch that burns Johnny all the way through, Carlito’s slight smile as he helps him up, one palm on the small of his back, Carlito’s breath whispering across the back of Johnny’s neck.

Carlito had told him that this was it, his arms sweeping open to take in the men around him, the drugs, the money, the streets, Carlito had told him that this was what he waiting for, and Johnny had swallowed his words whole, feeling the aching want burn down his throat.

 

 

 

**2.**

Carlito’s father gives Johnny his first piece.

Johnny holds it in his small hands and traces the handle and thinks that if he squinted, if he looked at it in just the right light, it could almost be a twin of Carlito’s, who had shown Johnny his own gun numerous times, proud of the sleek silver handle and the polished engraving of Carlito’s family name.

He takes the piece with him always, something Carlito had told him to do, and he ignores his mother’s sad, resigned looks – (and he ignores his mother’s quiet weeping in the kitchen when she thinks he can’t hear her, or in her bedroom, where she locks the door and places a pillow to her face and pretends that his father is still with them, his strong, calloused hands warm on her back) – and he drops out of school and he goes to parties and he sleeps with girls and he watches Carlito when Carlito is not watching him, and he forgets what his ma says about losing himself, so he starts to steal.

First, its small things, like bottles of liquor at the store down the block, and then its big things, like knocking off the rival gang at gunpoint, Johnny breathing hard in his mask, his hands trembling on the gun as Carlito picks cash and drugs out the safe deftly, quickly, never using Johnny’s name when he speaks to him. That one is easy, painless, no blood shed as Johnny and Carlito race down the street, their hearts pounding like gunfire in their chests, and they had laughed and yelled, excited, when they reached Carlito’s house, but Carlito’s father had only sighed softly when Carlito had given him the score, his mouth a flat line, unimpressed.

***

That night, Carlito breaks open one of the bottles from his father’s wine cellar, something old and rich that he takes swig after swig from before passing it to Johnny (who drinks it despite the taste), and he lifts up his shirt, showing Johnny the scars that his father had given him. Johnny’s fingers hover over Carlito’s chest, his stomach, and Carlito moves just enough that Johnny’s hands touch him, momentum, and Carlito feels warm and solid and Johnny wants so badly to kiss him, so badly to pull him close and taste the wine on Carlito’s tongue, but he won’t, he can’t, his fingers flexing with one aborted attempt after another.

It’s maybe one, two, three minutes, and Carlito lets Johnny lay his hands on him, lets him feel the breaths that Carlito pulls in, that Carlito pushes out, and he doesn’t move away.

Carlito says something small and soft in Spanish and Johnny says, “What?” before Carlito places the wine on the floor and cradles Johnny’s face between his palms, careful, so careful.

His mouth is slightly red, wet from where he licks his lips, and his hands are warm on Johnny’s face, strong, and Johnny watches Carlito watching him, watches his lips part softly, watches him say, “You’re my only friend,” the Spanish fluid on his tongue.

There are scars on his palms, calluses that tickle Johnny’s face, and Johnny’s gaze lowers to Carlito’s mouth and Carlito smiles, slow, and Johnny wants to say, “Me too,” wants to say, “Come here,” wants to say, “Kiss me,” but Carlito gives one more sad smile before he turns away.

 

 

 

**3.**

They grow up attending funerals together.

At every one, Carlito’s father would stay seated in the high-backed pews despite the wails of each dead boy’s mother, and sometimes Carlito would be next to him, straight-faced, emotionless, silent, and then sometimes Carlito would be next to Johnny, trembling, crying, his hands whispering up Johnny’s arm. It’s those times that he gets hammered, usually climbing up the tree next to Johnny’s bedroom late at night, scraping the rough bark with limbless, drunken hands, laughing, tapping at Johnny’s window until Johnny opens it, rubbing the sleep from his eyes.

It’s those times that Carlito brings a bottle or two of something with him, passing it back and forth on the floor of Johnny’s room, showing him his new bruises, his mouth raw and wet with hunger. It’s a routine, and more than that, it’s a ritual, Johnny nodding sagely at what Carlito says, shivering in the cold until Carlito grabs a blanket from the bed or – better yet – wraps his arms around Johnny’s shoulders, a ritual that begins with a shooting, a stabbing, a bloody disagreement with the cops, and ends with Carlito pressed flush against Johnny’s side, drinking himself to death, telling stories and tragedies and half-whispered secrets that everybody already knows.

Carlito says, “He was my friend, you know,” meaning the dead boy, all the dead boys, and Johnny sighs and pulls him closer and says, “He was my friend, too.”

Carlito laughs, short and sharp, and says, in Spanish, “Why do all of our friends keep dying?” and Johnny bites his tongue so hard that it bleeds.

 

 

 

**4.**

He sleeps with Lucia.

It’s not an accident, and he’s not even sorry, especially when Carlito looks at him with wide, shining eyes and opens his mouth to say something, something biting, before he thinks better of it and forces himself to smile instead. He doesn’t touch Johnny, doesn’t bring him close, but he does make a move like some sort of pretend punch on Johnny’s arm, Carlito’s fist strained and menacing, stopping just short of Johnny’s shoulder, Carlito laughing sharply, telling him that he will kill him if he hurts her.

Johnny doesn’t say that he already has, the quick, few wet gasps on Lucia’s neck the night before, his lips moaning out her brother’s name when she had gripped him hard, her teeth on the shell of his ear, and he remembers opening his mouth to say that he was sorry, to say that he didn’t mean it, her faraway gaze, and he remembers her sliding her dress back on after he pulled away from her, the slow slide of the fabric up her curves, the smooth indentations in her skin that match the ridges of Johnny’s teeth, the swirls and arches of his fingerprints. She had sat on the edge of the bed for the longest time, one hand on her face, the long straight line of her back sharp in the low light, before she had told him to get out of her room, her voice unwavering.

He had, swaying in the doorframe, sobering up a little and turning around to ask her if she wanted to try again sometime, but she had slammed the door in his face so hard that he had moved back against the wall in surprise, breathing in and then out once, twice, before he had fumbled down the steps to rejoin the party, picking up someone’s abandoned beer bottle. He had sat down on the couch and bummed a cigarette and he had watched Carlito spin obviously fabricated stories, his hands wild in the space between him and the crowd, and Johnny had let out one long, low sigh and thought how much easier everything would be if he left this all behind.

 

 

 

**5.**

The day before Johnny’s eighteenth birthday, he walks into a liquor store with Carlito and watches him shoot a man in the chest.

***

(The funeral was long and well-attended and before Carlito’s father had grasped Johnny by the scruff of his neck and ordered him to lie low for a bit, Johnny had stood in the back and watched the man’s family cry exhaustedly over the closed casket. He had stood there until someone had gripped his elbow and questioned his relationship with the dead and then he had ran and crashed a big invite-only Solano family party and gotten drunk and accidentally fucked one of Carlito’s cousins against the door of Carlito’s bedroom, his hands wide and tight around the other man’s waist, the sloppy kisses and biting, scratching fingers and the way that Johnny had gone to the bathroom afterwards and stared at the red mouth-shaped welt on his neck, his fists trembling on the edges of the sink. He had started to laugh, long and loud and uncontrollable, until Carlito had found him, Johnny’s bleeding hands and the pieces of the shattered mirror on the floor.)

***

There’s a brief stint in Mexico there, a fleeting summer that Johnny (mostly) forgets because it’s filled with weed and pills and tequila and Carlito gasping wet, yawning sobs into the place where Johnny’s shoulder meets his neck, crying over the loss of his freedom, crying over the loss of his sister who had stayed behind, crying over the disappointed look in his father’s eyes, but never – never, ever, ever – crying over the loss of the dead man’s life.

Mexico is beautiful and hot and unforgiving, and Carlito takes Johnny to clubs and bars and feeds him hallucinogens and finds him pretty girls and asks him to dance – where they touch maybe once, maybe twice, a smooth, light brush of skin as Carlito smiles and moves away – and buys him expensive cocktails and introduces him to all his friends and tells him that he wishes this could last forever. He and Johnny stumble home drunk together and make it up the stairs, sometimes collapsing together in Johnny’s room, but mostly staying apart, and one of these times – this time – is the first time that Johnny kisses him.

It’s slow and painful, Johnny reaching over for Carlito when they’re lying drunk and gutted on Johnny’s bed, Johnny’s eyes half closed with exhaustion, and he doesn’t mean to, but he does, moving so his mouth lines up with Carlito’s, his lips gentle and slick, and Carlito kisses him back, soft at first and then rough, quick, pulling him closer, his thumbs bruising Johnny’s cheeks, and Johnny is breathing in, his chest on fire, wanting more, needing more, his fingers embedded in Carlito’s shirt, when suddenly Carlito pulls back.

“Fuck, Johnny,” he says, and then again. “What the fuck.”

“Carlito,” Johnny starts, but Carlito is getting up, standing up with difficulty, his legs not quite wanting to work, pushing himself off the bed and wobbling towards the door.

“What the fuck,” he says again, and again, and again.

Johnny places a palm over his face, and he can’t help it, he feels the ache moving inside of him and he starts to cry, softly, and he wants to tell him that he didn’t mean it, he wants to say that it was nothing, that he was drunk and lonely and stupid and playing some unfunny game, but he also wants to tell him that he’s never loved anyone more than he loves Carlito. “Carlito,” he says again, and his voice is broken, dead.

“Please,” he says, and Carlito stops.

“Please,” he says again, and it’s a whisper, something close to a prayer, and Johnny looks at Carlito with big, wet eyes, and Carlito looks back at Johnny, and then he pulls in one shuttered breath.

It’s not a moment of realization, but it’s close, Carlito moving one step closer to the bed and then one more and then all the way, pulling Johnny to him and kissing him again, fast, rough, swallowing Johnny’s mews of protest, swallowing Johnny’s tongue, his rough fingers pulling Johnny’s shirt over his head and away from them, doing the same to himself.

“I love you,” Carlito says in Spanish, and Johnny kisses him until Carlito says it again, and then kisses him once more, his swollen mouth numb in the space between them.

“I love you, too,” Johnny says back, and Carlito doesn’t let him go.

***

(He dreams about him sometimes, the man that Carlito shot.

In the dreams, he’s the one that Carlito watches from outside of the liquor store for a few moments, his face a cold mask, unfeeling. In the dreams, he’s the one who Carlito walks up to, Carlito’s hand out in front of him, the hand that holds the gun un-trembling, solid, still, he’s the one who almost says, “Wait,” his hand out, before Carlito shoots him, the bullet making one small hole right below his heart.

In the dreams, Carlito never says he’s sorry, either.)

***

They last until they get back to the States.

They last until Carlito’s father finds out about them from one of Carlito’s bodyguards and beats Carlito until Carlito admits that it was nothing, that he never loved Johnny, that it was just fucking, and the day after, Carlito stands in front of Johnny and asks him not to come around anymore, his bruised face as he says this, as he doesn’t look Johnny in the eyes, as he closes the door before Johnny can say something, anything about how fucked up this is.

They last until Carlito doesn’t stand up for himself, until Carlito stops talking to Johnny, stops meeting his eyes in crowds, stops coming by Johnny’s window in the middle of the night, and – the day before Johnny leaves California for good, for forever – Carlito looks at him one last time, looks at him and then looks away, his voice pained when he says, “I’m sorry.”

And Johnny gives a derisive laugh, sharp enough that Carlito winces at the sound.

“I’m not,” he says.

And Carlito waits, but Johnny never says goodbye.

 

 

 

**6.**

(Before they left for Mexico, word on the streets was that Carlito shot the man only after his father caught them both in Lucia’s abandoned and unlocked bedroom, Carlito’s mouth in a very comprising position. Word on the streets was that Carlito’s father paid Carlito for the hit in attention and approval, that he stopped beating him for a week, a month, maybe until he found out about Johnny.

Carlito never says a word about this to Johnny, pretends that he didn’t even know the man’s name, and for a while Johnny lets him, plays along, pretends that what the boys say out on the streets – laughing cruelly when anyone says Carlito’s name – is just a rumor.)

 

 

 

**7.**

Before Johnny leaves California, word on the streets is that Johnny is a fucking dead man.

 

 

 

**8.**

He moves to New York.

***  
It’s not the first boy that he sleeps with, but it’s maybe the second or third that mentions the tattoo on his wrist, the one with Carlito’s family name, and Johnny lies and says it’s something stupid, something he regrets, and the boy shrugs and moves his mouth over the ink there and Johnny closes his eyes and doesn’t say anything else for the rest of the night.

***

He lives in a two-bedroom walkup in Prospect Park with three other people, sleeps on the floor for the first two months before one of his roommates moves out and lets him keep the mattress, and he works odd jobs here and there, wherever he can find one. He tries going back to school, but doesn’t make it past the third day, and he calls his mom on one of the last remaining pay phones in all of New York City, a remnant that stands shrouded in graffiti on his walk to the train.

He sleeps around, girls and boys, both, whoever, takes them home or goes with them or fucks them in the bathroom of this dingy club that one of his roommates always drags him to, his mouth on some girl’s neck as she pulls him into the handicap stall and hitches up her skirt, hooking her thumbs into the loop of his belt. He doesn’t take numbers, or takes them and throws them away or washes them off his arm or whatever, and he drinks a lot, smokes a lot, takes pills or powders as payment for jobs sometimes, takes so much he forgets his own name, forgets where he is, forgets why he can’t ever go back to California.

He doesn’t do it a lot, and then he does do it a lot, and then he does it all the time, and then he starts selling to support his habit, and most of the time he’s okay with it, being indebted like that. He sells and tries (so many times) to stop selling and can’t stop and (barely) makes money and sells some more, and people start remembering his name, start smiling when they see him, and most of the time he smiles back, and most of the time he likes being needed.

He funds parties and talks to people and slips little baggies into everyone’s hands and he’s the life of the party, and everyone always wants to see him, always wants to ask him how he is, and most of the time he can lie to himself and pretend that it’s because they really care.

***

Nobody ever asks him where he’s from.

 

 

 

**9.**

He leaves New York.

***

He meets Paige and Charlie at a gas station in Philly and travels with them for six months, on the road following railroad tracks and desolate highways and curving, winding back roads. They take turns driving Paige’s beat-up Bug, and Charlie asks him what he does for a living and Johnny doesn’t lie, turning out his pockets to show them the last of his stash, what will get him from here to wherever they want to go.

Charlie is running from an abusive ex and Paige is following her because apparently Paige has been in love with Charlie from the first day that they met – Paige says this through the smoke of the blunt Johnny has rolled for her, sitting on the rusted bench outside of a bathroom somewhere close to Ohio, the halo of her hair brilliantly colored underneath the streetlamp, Charlie inside washing up and Johnny sitting next to Paige and (almost, almost, Jesus fucking Christ, almost) high enough to spill all of his secrets – and she tells him that they invited Johnny along because he seemed (still seems) sad and lonely and harmless and – most importantly – he has drugs. Johnny shrugs and tells her that they don’t have to worry, that he’s mostly into guys – mostly, he says, and then coughs and then laughs, Paige smiling next to him, her hand warm on his arm, his hand warm on her knee – and that as long as they don’t go anywhere near California, he will pitch in for gas.

Paige pulls the blunt away from her mouth, the smoke spilling out of her lips in plumes, and makes a face. “Cali’s lame,” she says, and Johnny’s smile is big enough to be blinding.

***

In Chicago, Charlie almost gets arrested at a party when she pulls a knife on a guy who puts an unwanted hand on her thigh. Johnny talks them all down, always the peacemaker, offering free pills to everyone in attendance, offering some cash, and takes Charlie out the door with one arm around her waist, telling her that he can’t let her kill him because then they’ll all go to prison and he’s too pretty to be locked up from the world.

“Fuck off, Johnny,” she says once they’re outside, and pushes him away. Paige is suddenly there, a hand on Charlie’s wrist, and Charlie turns to her and lays her forehead on Paige’s shoulder, her arms wrapped around Paige’s middle, and just breathes for a few minutes, her back moving up and down silently from where Johnny can see.

“Are you okay?” he says after a while, and Paige looks at him with big eyes and then back down at Charlie and Charlie presses her lips to the side of Paige’s neck and mumbles something that Johnny can’t hear.

“Yeah,” Paige says for her, nodding her head, her grip on Charlie tightening. “We’re okay.”

***

They move further into the middle of the country, sleeping in hayfields and abandoned barns and stretched out on schoolyard blacktops, lying on the blankets that Paige pulls from the trunk, pointing up at the starry sky and yelling out the names of the constellations they remember from textbooks.

They don’t have any particular destination in mind, and even less ambition to get anywhere in particular, and they save money when they can – Johnny teaching Paige how to fish for quarters in vending machines and grocery store carousels, how to steal industrial rolls of toilet paper, how to fill their backpacks with plastic silverware and napkins when they stop in small town coffee shops for the free wifi – and they play pool for crumpled twenties, Charlie always winning, mostly because she’s really good, but also because she wears low cut shirts and drapes herself over Paige, her painted fingernails sliding smoothly up the small of Paige’s back. Johnny takes them to gay bars whenever he can find one, dances with men, dances with women, gets led to their homes sometimes, telling Paige and Charlie that he will call them in the morning.

Somewhere around the third month, Paige and Charlie – finally – start sleeping together, and Johnny only knows this because he wakes up to Charlie’s hushed, stuttered breathing in the middle of the night, Paige and her mouth on the skin of Charlie’s thighs, the soft of her belly, the swells and dips of her hipbones, and he turns away and they don’t hear him move, and he closes his eyes and thinks of Carlito for the first time in a long time, his hand sliding smooth underneath his shorts, underneath the elastic of his underwear, and his breathing becomes ragged, too, and he can hear Charlie let out a little moan, and his hand feels slick and bruised and he remembers Carlito’s mouth and Carlito’s long, slim fingers and he remembers the way that Carlito would leave wet, trailing kisses up Johnny’s neck and he remembers the way Carlito would bite down on the skin of Johnny’s shoulders, hard enough that he would leave marks, and he pulls in another breath and stops himself from moaning Carlito’s name and he hears Charlie’s little mew of pleasure and he can’t fucking hold it in any longer and he guesses neither can Charlie because they both come at the same time.

Paige crawls up the length of Charlie’s body and kisses her, two wet mouths pushing and pulling, and breaks away only to say, “Next time we’ll ask you to join in, Johnny.”

***

(They do it only once, just after they pass through Colorado.

It’s fun and they like it, but they don’t do it again, mostly because Johnny doesn’t want to fuck them up, and mostly because Paige and Charlie don’t need a third, and mostly because they’re close enough to California that Johnny keeps having dreams where Carlito shoots Johnny in the chest over and over and over again and he feels like he’s losing his mind and he’s taking more drugs and less care of himself and Paige and Charlie can see this and don’t know what to do.

In Salt Lake, Paige asks Johnny if he’s okay, the cool metal of her rings searing the heat of his flesh, and he lies and says yes, slipping another pill between his teeth.)

***

They part in Idaho, Charlie wanting to venture further south and Johnny unwilling to even step foot in Nevada, Paige crying when Johnny tells them that he’s leaving, Charlie wiping away Paige’s tears with the pads of her thumbs, smearing mascara and eyeliner down Paige’s cheeks. They have dinner one last time, Johnny paying for a big meal that he only eats a third of, tired, apprehensive, nervous about being alone again, and when he leaves them, Charlie kisses him for longer than she should, stepping aside only when Paige puts a hand on the small of her back.

He thanks them and then feels stupid for thanking them and then thanks them again, giving them a little cash for the road, giving them little baggies that he’s picked up along the way. He waves them off from the bus stop, his backpack heavy on his shoulders, and as soon as he can’t see the Bug any longer, he starts to walk.

 

 

 

**10.**

The funny thing is – the really funny thing is – just because Johnny left California, it doesn’t mean that Carlito stayed.

***

He finds him in Yellowstone.

Johnny plans to buy a cheap sleeping bag on Craigslist and head out into the park, camp out for a few days before hitching a ride back East, but he goes into the local coffee shop to sit for a few moments and spots Carlito – bruised eyes, split lip, smiling wide at Johnny when Johnny looks at him – at one of the tables. “Fuck,” Johnny says and moves to go back out the door, but Carlito jumps up and places a hand on his arm, his grip tight and unforgiving.

“I just want to talk,” Carlito says, hushed, and Johnny looks around, but can’t see any other men that might have traveled with him. “Johnny,” Carlito says, and Johnny looks back at him and can’t help it, his heart rate skyrockets, his palms feel sweaty from where his fists are clenched. “It’s just you and me here, it’s just us. Come sit.”

Carlito leads him to the table he was just at, the baristas over by the counter giving them curious glances, and Carlito orders two coffees, black, and places one in front of Johnny and encourages him to drink so Johnny does, burning his tongue. Carlito doesn’t say anything for a few moments, his palms flat on the table, looking at Johnny, his face swollen and happy.

“How’d you find me?” Johnny asks, and his voice is rough, breaking with each word.

“Your ma,” Carlito says, and then places a hand on Johnny’s when Johnny’s eyes widen. “She asked me to get you. She wants you to come home, Johnny.” He breathes out, once, looking down at the table and then looking back up again. “So do I.”

“Your father,” Johnny starts, but Carlito never lets him finish.

“My father’s dead.”

Johnny stills, Carlito’s touch electrifying on Johnny’s skin. “What?” he whispers. Carlito’s fingers are tight enough that it starts to hurt.

“My father died last week. The FBI raided our house, shot him six times.” Carlito’s eyes are swimming and Johnny opens his mouth and then closes it again, unsure what to say.

“Lucia…?”

“She’s fine,” Carlito says, and then looks away. “She was gone when they,” his voice falters and he clears his throat, looks back at Johnny, “when the FBI came in.”

“Where were you?” Johnny asks, and he feels Carlito’s hand start to slip away from his arm, so he pulls him back, close enough that he can feel Carlito’s pulse. “Were you in the house?”

“Yes,” Carlito says, and then nothing else. He nods, gives Johnny a little deprecating half smile, and Johnny wants to say that he’s sorry, he wants to say that he never wanted this – any of this – to happen, but he can’t make the words pass through his teeth, can’t open his mouth because if he did, he’s afraid only sobs would come out, the image of Carlito blurring and straightening with Johnny’s tears, and he wants so badly to ask him if he’s alright, but he’s not sure that he wants to hear the answer.

Carlito sniffs, his eyes wet, and keeps Johnny’s hands on his own, keeps close, and Johnny wants to ask Carlito if he wants to get out of here the same time that Carlito says, “I have a hotel room.”

Johnny smiles and nods and Carlito looks breathless for a moment, his chin trembling, his skin pale beneath the fluorescent light, washed, before he parts his lips and leans over to kiss Johnny.

***

(It’s the first time that Johnny’s felt like himself in a really long time, and Carlito touches him and pulls him close and Johnny kisses him through tears, sober for once, biting and scraping his teeth along the angle of Carlito’s jaw, shedding clothing quickly, but not quickly enough, wanting this and nothing else, wanting more, Carlito saying Johnny’s name over and over and over again until Johnny presses against him and captures Carlito’s mouth with his own, unmoving.

Johnny licks the salt of Carlito’s tears and Carlito speaks in rapid fire Spanish, calling Johnny the names from their childhood, kissing and kissing and kissing, Johnny forgetting how to form words, Carlito yelling Johnny’s name loud enough that the couple next door bangs on the wall. The first time is fast, making up for all the lost time, but the second time is slow and soft and perfect, and this – this is what Johnny never wants to forget – the slide of Carlito’s mouth up the knobs of Johnny’s spine, the whisper of his fingertips on Johnny’s chest, the tickle of his tongue on the insides of Johnny’s thighs.

Neither one of them has forgotten the shape and feel and form of the other, neither one of them has forgotten how the other tastes, and Johnny fits within the cradle of Carlito’s arms seamlessly, still and solid and unyielding, Carlito trying to imprint his happiness, his gratitude, on Johnny’s skin, leaving red, mouth-shaped marks in his wake.

It’s like Johnny never left.)

***

He moves to California.  



End file.
